Slipping Away
by aloquaciousgirl
Summary: Jacob’s emotions are stinging fiercely after Bella makes her choice and chooses Edward.


Title**: Slipping Away**

Author: aloquaciousgirl

Rating: PG/K+

Pairings/Characters: Jacob Black-Jacob pining for Bella.

Summary: Jacob's emotions are stinging fiercely after Bella makes her choice and chooses Edward.

Disclaimer: Twilight is the creation of S. Meyer.

Notes: This is written from Jacob's POV, one of many 'sidebar' stories that was born off of a growing fic that is to date unpublished. Its set during Eclipse.

--

The entire world is falling apart at its seams and he's barking at me to clean my room.

Whatever.

I shoved some clothes farther under the bed so that they wouldn't be visible to whoever it was we were cleaning for.

It wasn't fair, _I _love her.

Generally, cleaning took a back seat. Right now especially, it was the last thing on my mind.

Edward, she chose _Edward_. All he ever did was hurt her.

And he broke her. He broke Bella into pieces.

I tossed some schoolbooks haphazardly onto the dresser. Like I have time for that now. I was sure that if Bella hadn't traded me in for that-that _leech_, maybe she'd rag on me about it.

He didn't deserve her.

_Why didn't you finish that paper, Jacob? _I could even hear her wheedling tone in my ear as easy as if I had just heard her voice that morning.

_Pack stuff, _I'd shrug and grin so she wouldn't worry, I didn't want her to have to worry.

She'd frown like she always did, and I'd immediately try to think of something to turn it into a smile, maybe even a laugh.

_That doesn't matter, its not more important than school, Jacob._

I could even see her eyes flittering as she searched for a follow up argument, _how are you going to get into a good college if you flunk out of high school?_

Like that ever even mattered? Not anymore. Maybe it never did.

The pack is my life, even if I don't ever have to be pack leader…I'd never be able to run away from it. That was it for me.

_This is your life Bella, and every minute that you spend with him is another minute that its slipping away. I can't watch you kill yourself for him, and if he loved you, if he really loved you, he wouldn't let you do it._

It was funny how my cheek still stung from where she had slapped me. I had looked in the mirror afterwards, and I could still make out the shape of her hand across my cheek. It was funny that I had been able to feel it--I was a werewolf, but it still hurt. It was funny, but…

A lot of things still hurt.

It hurt that she didn't love me.

It hurt that she was going to kill herself for Edward, but she couldn't live for me.

It hurt to watch her hurting herself for him…because he wasn't worth it.

I wouldn't ever have done that to her, I wouldn't have asked her to suffer for me.

I could have made her happy. I still could make her happy, if she'd let me. I would do whatever it would take, I'd keep his promises to her. I wouldn't ever leave her, or hurt her…

The way she looked at me…like I was the one hurting her, it wasn't fair. The way she yelled at me, like I was the one putting her life at risk every moment she was with me…

How could she even know that she wouldn't die first? I knew…I knew some things. Like, that sometimes they couldn't stop, sometimes they _didn't _stop.

Why was it worth it? Why was _he _worth dying for.

My friends were so unhelpful. I hated having a pack mind, and so I tried to not think about her, or the Cullens at all…but sometimes it slipped out. I blamed Sam for that, for bringing them up to begin with.

_She's just a masochist, _Embry suggested, _some people are just like that, Jake._

I punched Embry in the face, Embry hadn't shared his opinions since then.

"Jacob? Is that room clean yet?" I heard my dad bark hoarsely from the kitchen. He was doing dishes, _dishes_!

If I had the time to give it much thought at all, I'd think he had cracked. We did not ever do dishes until we absolutely ran out of clean ones and had to do that, or eat off of the table.

"Almost!" I grumbled back, throwing a large shell onto my dresser with a little too much force, wincing as it shattered across the dresser. "_Shit_." I muttered.

And he accused me of hurting her. That _I _could hurt her. If anyone knew about hurting her it would be _him_, he'd nearly killed her. I'd take better care of her, better than that, I would be honest with her. She wasn't some fragile little thing like Edward thought she was, she was stronger than that.

"Jake!" He hollered again.

I sighed, shoving some more junk under my bed. I was good, nothing smelled at the very least, and that was enough to keep my dad happy, generally.

"Get out here, will you?"

I sighed again, I'd really rather not. I'd rather collapse onto my bed and think about all the ways that everything had gotten screwed up. It was always better to get it out of my system before I morphed, it was easier not to think about it around the pack then. And I was perfectly happy not to. Unlike Leah, I didn't want to dredge up my personal feelings and force everyone else in the pack to feel them.

"Jake!"

"Coming!" I hollered back, and pushed down the sigh that threatened to escape.

Hopefully this wouldn't take long and I could come back and sulk in peace.


End file.
